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Sunday, June 29, 2014

It's been a productive weekend here so far. Yesterday, I built a new garden bed just in front of the concrete of the front verandah. I have added some nice tropical style plants to deal with the heat, and to give that nice lush, tropical look. I took a lot of plants from the other house last weekend, as the garden down there needed a tidy up and a thin out, so I only purchased 3 plants all up. I will try and take a photo when the light is better, as the sun is beating down on it at the minute, which isn't great for photographing. I'm also trying to get through the sundry bits and pieces that needed washing, the things that you need to wait until you get a few of, to warrant running a load through the washing machine, towels, mats, table runners etc. Of course, I ran out of soap powder, and didn't feel like driving down the track to go to the shops, so thought I would finally try my hand at making liquid soap. I made soap powder a few months back, but I think that's quite expensive to make, so I'll see how this pans out.
Firstly, I grated up a cup of soap from a Sunlight bar of soap, which ended up being about 2/3 of a bar. I added this to 1 1/2 litres of water,

and stirred over a medium heat, until it was completely dissolved.

It was completely dissolved, with absolutely no grainy bits of soap left, and a nice clear liquid. I then added 1/2 cup of borax and 1/2 cup lectric/washing soda to the mix, and stirred until it thickened, which was pretty quick, only a minute or 2.

I then poured this mix in to a bucket, and filled the bucket up with water. I then stirred this mixture to combine it.

I left it to thicken up, but the mix was quite lumpy, so I used my old hand beater to beat it up in to a nice smooth mix.

Once nicely thickened and smooth, I poured it in to an old 3 litre milk bottle, leaving room at the top to shake it before use, and the rest got put in to lidded ice cream containers for storage. It made about 8 litres all up. You use 1/4 - 1/2 cup each load, and for any stains, rub it in to the stain before washing. I'll report back with how well or unwell it does the job.

Wednesday, June 25, 2014

Our girls are finally starting to have their babies. 2 have come along in the last 2 days...
A gorgeous, tiny little girl...soooo tiny, and looks just like her mum

And then this bully little bull calf...

I think he is going to end up just like his Dad....Mum's and bubs are doing well, and doing all the right things....there should be some more coming along soon as well hopefully as there are some fat looking girls wandering around...

Visitors

Busy Mum of 3. Nemma to 1 with another on the way. I keep heritage chooks and guinea fowl, and a couple of resident dogs. We live close to the big smoke on a couple of acres, and have 152 acres about 4 hours north, where we run some small scale cattle and a beautiful big bull. He keeps us in supply with some gorgeous little baby calves for our girls.